Category Archives: Fish & Seafood

During yesterday’s jaunt into town, KJ and I stopped for lunch at an overly Euro-chic cafe nestled on a busy street corner, adjacent to a parking garage, across from a questionable looking Eroski market, and with al fresco dining that soon contained a jubilant crowd of smokers. We were desperate and hungry. While KJ inhaled and lauded a burger, I chose a filet of salmon, cooked “al vapor” (sounds much better than steamed al Holiday Inn) on a bed of mashed potatoes and salad, dressed with a creamy yet light curry sauce. It was (surprisingly) delicious!

I had to steal that dressing.

Today, I attempted to recreate this little touch of goodness to accompany a fresh salad nicoise. A few spoonfuls of thick Greek yogurt serve as a great base for creamy dressings. With ingredients easily layered in thereafter – why not a bit of fragrant curry?

Curried Yogurt Dressing

Ingredients (to my best approximation and enough to dress about 4ish side salads):

Whisk together…

2 heaping spoonfuls of thick Greek yogurt

2 tablespoons Curry Madras

1 teaspoon Garam Masala

juice from 1/2 lemon

good olive oil and white wine vinegar at a 3:1 ratio

salt to taste

Yes, I need to take better notes next time, but dressings are thankfully forgiving and can be adjusted to taste quite easily. I added oil and vinegar until the yogurt became diluted to a just barely creamy consistency and whisked until all the clumpiness smoothed. This probably entailed 1/4 cup of oil, more or less.

With another gorgeously warm spring day before us, we enjoyed lunch again al fresco, but in the comforts and tranquility of our own backyard. Simply lovely.

KJ and I made our way into the city early yesterday for a bit of last minute back to school shopping and some desperately needed fridge restocking. I had been looking forward to my Saturday in the city all week – a cafe con leche and a nice piece of cake at my favorite cafe; a leisurely stroll along the main boutique street; and the last odds and ends collected at Corte Ingles, Spain’s all-in-one department store, before heading home.

But as we rounded the last bend into Palma, traffic came to a sudden stop. Accident? No. Boat show? Nope. It was el primer día de las rebajas, the first day of winter sales in Mallorca. We managed to find parking in probably the farthest removed underground garage from the supermercado; shoved our way through Zaras; patiently waited in a winding queue at H&M; and penetrated cyclical waves of people as we made our way towards Corte Ingles.

Because of the distance back to the car, our grocery shopping had to be carefully curated – no heavy things and just the necessities, with the exception of ingredients needed for our preselected dinner recipe – a fish bathed in rich puttanesca sauce. The original recipe from Saveur called for thick swordfish steaks, but I wanted a lighter yet meaty fish that would hold up well in the sauce. Thus, we chose a large perch fillet, cut into smaller pieces later.

Heat oil in a large skillet over high heat. In the meantime, season fish with salt and pepper. Add fish fillets to skillet and cook until just browned on both sides, ~3-4 minutes, turning once in between. Transfer fish to a plate and set aside.

Place a touch more oil into the skillet and turn down temperature to medium heat. Cook garlic and anchovies, until soft and fragrant, ~2 minutes. Next, add tomatoes, olives, capers, and chile; cook until tomatoes become soft and juices release. Add enough water to just cover the bottom of the pan. Allow the mixture to reduce, with a total cooking time of ~15 minutes. Return fish to skillet; add parsley and lemon juice. Cook until fish is cooked through, ~5 minutes. Serve fillets with a few generous spoonfuls of sauce.

While working my way through Eric Ripert’s recipes and at the suggestion of my similarly food obsessed sister, I gave Ripert’s method of unilaterally cooking salmon a go. Essentially, the method entails cooking a skinned fillet from one side only. The result – a “barely” cooked piece of fish that’s both melt-in-the-mouth delicate and flaky. I think I’d rank this as a new favorite, a mere smidge behind salmon in the raw.

The fish can be accompanied by a number of sauces and/or sides. It’s so unbelievably soft and buttery in texture that I could have easily devoured it all on its own. Nonetheless, the first time through, I made a separate soy based sauce that I normally would use for a braise. The onset of addiction came instantaneously; for a second night, the fillets were accompanied by a simple coconut curry, with skin “chips” made from the saved salmon skin.

On each occasion, the barely cooked salmon was center plated with sauce spooned around.

I started the sauce first before preparing the rest of the components for the dish. In a bowl, combine soy, ginger, vinegar, and sesame seed oil. Dissolve kuzu powder (cornstarch can be substituted) in 1/4 pint of water and add to the mixture. Mix well. In a small saucepan, add olive oil and heat over medium-high heat. Place in onions and cook until translucent (5-6 minutes). Lower heat to medium-low and pour in sauce mixture. Bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally, until sauce thickens (2-3 minutes). Turn heat to the lowest setting and cover. Reheat just before plating.

For the fish, the technique is unbelievably simple: place about 1/4 pint (1/2 cup) of water into a skillet or saute pan, enough to just cover the bottom. Season the water with a bit of salt and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Season the skinned salmon fillets on both sides with salt and pepper and place into the pan. Keeping the water at a bare simmer, cook the fish until the top of the fillet is just warm to the touch. The time for this will vary. My thinner fillets finished in about 5 minutes, while the thicker pieces took about 10 minutes. Once done, remove the salmon and set aside for plating.

Left: Add enough water to just cover the bottom of a pan. Place salmon fillets in simmering water. Right: Cook fillets until the tops are just warm to the touch.

Using the same pan, pour out most of the remaining water, keeping just a few tablespoons of reserve liquid. Over medium heat, add spinach leaves. Cook, constantly turning the leaves over, until the spinach is just wilted (1-2 minutes). For plating, place salmon fillet atop a bed of spinach and spoon sauce around.

Place all ingredients for the coconut curry into a medium sized saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce temperature and simmer for a few minutes. Cover and reduce heat to lowest setting. Reheat just before plating.

Prepare barely cooked salmon as described above.

Since the skin of the salmon contains most of the healthy omega-3 fatty acids, for the curried salmon, I decided to save the skin off the fillet and make skin “chips”! Thanks to Chica Andaluza’s helpful comment, I can now scale a fish – before skinning the fillet, use a blunt or butter knife to scrape the scales off, going against the grain of the skin under running water. Works like a champ!

Using either the same skillet once the fillets are cooked and removed (with water emptied and dried off) or separate skillet, heat a few tablespoons of olive oil at medium-high temperature. Place salmon skin strips, outer skin side down, into the pan and let cook until the skins shrink and crisp up, 4-5 minutes.

To plate, center salmon fillets, spoon curry sauce around, and top with crispy salmon skin. I added a bit of quinoa alongside the fillet as well.

Hubby voted in favor of the latter recipe slightly ahead of the first. I voted just the opposite. Nevertheless, in regards to methodology, I will never go back… never.

Like this:

Now with the Thanksgiving holiday behind us and the last bits of turkey thigh (I roasted turkey thighs, rather than the entire bird, and so glad that I did – not a fan of breast meat), rib roast, sides and desserts still sitting in the fridge, it was time for something light and delicately flavored. It’s been leftovers for lunch, every day since.

Because Thanksgiving dinner happened rather spontaneously, I did not post any recipes. I will do something next year – I promise.

Now back to the salmon. I decided to use salmon for this dish; another popular fish choice is black cod – which I’m sure many people have had in a Japanese restaurant. The miso paste can also be used for meats. The longer you allow to marinade, the deeper the flavor will be – overnight would be ideal. I only marinated for an hour. The veggies cook up quickly and can be prepared when the fish goes in the oven.

In a small bowl, mix together ingredients for miso paste. Thoroughly coat salmon in miso paste and let marinate, or cover and refrigerate overnight.

Wash bok choy and cut in half lengthwise. Check for dirt and sand that gets trapped close to the stalk – two or three rinses may be needed. The last thing anyone wants is to crunch on some sand. Let all water drain well before cooking.

Preheat oven on broil setting to 450 F. Remove any excess marinade, place fish on a baking sheet lined with foil. Broil for 7-8 mins. Check for doneness. The fish should be nicely caramelized all around and just barely cooked through.

While the fish cooks in the oven, in sauté pan or wok over high heat, add oil and wait until hot. Add veggies, stir fry for 30 seconds. Add salt and sugar, and toss around. Add stock and cover for 3-4 minutes until cook through and but still crisp. And now plate up the veggies and the fish should be just about ready.

Like this:

Friends of ours, a few days back, so generously gifted us a beautiful huge sole (thanks, Gr & Van!). After some reading, I found a recipe from Jamie Oliver for a baked sole that conveniently used many of the same ingredients I had already acquired for Eric Ripert’s Chicken Palliard with Tomatoes, Fennel and Olives the day before. I actually don’t mind eating something two days in a row, especially if it’s a flavor combination that I find myself desperately craving again.

Much to my amused surprise, however, the two dishes were actually quite different. Oliver’s recipe called for a couple of lemons while Ripert’s added raisins instead. The subtle change in ingredients interestingly enough gave two completely distinct finishes despite other common ingredients: the former focused on tartness and tanginess while the latter highlighted with sweetness.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees C (400 degrees F). Place tomatoes, garlic, oregano, basil, and onion into a large mixing bowl. Drizzle balsamic vinegar and a few tablespoons of olive oil. Add the juice and zest of 1 lemon. Combine everything thoroughly, salt and pepper to taste.

Spread the mixture into a single layer covering the bottom of a roasting pan or dish (large enough to hold the sole). Next, rinse and dry the fish. Using a sharp knife, cut several slits across the fish, 2.5 cm (1 inch) apart and with depth hitting the bone to allow juices to penetrate. Place the fish on top of the bed of tomatoes.

Finally, using the same mixing bowl as before, combine chopped olives, parsley, and the juice and zest of the second lemon. Add another drizzle of olive oil and mix to combine. Lay the mixture evenly on top of the fish. Make sure to pour all juices in as well. Bake for 12-15 minutes, depending on thickness of the fish. Check the fish for doneness by piercing with a knife; the flesh should flake easily from the bone. I ended up adding on another 3 minutes on top, since the sole was relatively meaty.

Our fish, in the raw, came with rough little scales intact; I have yet to acquire any fish cleaning skills and usually rely on the fishmonger to do the dirty work (“¿Es posible para limpiar el pescado?”). Thus, after one panicked phone call to Van (“the fish has … scales!?”) and her polite consultation, I served the fish filleted, sans skin after cooking. With a few big heaping spoonfuls of tomatoes and sauce, garnished with fresh parsley, and alongside a bed of red rice, it was lovely… again(ish).

Like this:

During yesterday’s supermarket binge, I got a few extra salmon steaks to last me through the weekend. Still plowing my way through the work pile, I should give myself credit for having enough foresight to pick an easy fish to cook. But really, I just simply love salmon.

Tonight’s dinner came courtesy of Mark Bittman’s Four-Spice Salmon. His recipe calls for the use of fresh ground spices – cumin, coriander, nutmeg, and a small dash of ground cloves. I omitted the cloves as they were the only things missing from my spice rack. But everything else got tossed into the trusty mortar and pestle. I went to work, grinding and blending my spice rub. The aromatic notes released from the fresh spices were fragrant and wonderful. I now understood Bittman’s emphasis on freshness, and his strong discouragement in the use of pre-ground mixes, that “it’s a shame to waste good salmon by coating it with stale, insipid spices.”

mixture of cumin, coriander, and nutmeg, and coarse ground in a mortar/pestle

Season salmon on both sides with salt and pepper. Combine spices and grind into a coarse powder. Press some of the spice mixture onto the tops of the fillets, or both sides for extra flavor.

Next, add oil or butter to a large skillet and heat over medium-high temperature. Once the oil begins to shimmer, place fillets into the pan, coated side down. Cook for 2-3 minutes until browned on the bottom. Turn the salmon over and cook for another 2-3 minutes.

Once finished, I laid my salmon steak (which I had pre-cut before cooking into 1.5 inch wide mini-steaks) onto a bed of raw spinach and carrots. The salmon was so flavourful that there was no need for any additional dressing. The spinach nicely wilted just a bit from the heat of the fillets and the carrots added some sweetness, balancing well with the cumin and coriander.

Like this:

Hubby is one super guy. Every time just before he heads out for work-travel, he always makes a ginormous supermarket run. He hauls home everything that I hastily scribe to him in a text message and whatever else that looked good. As a food lover alike, usually a lot piques his interest. The fridge becomes so overly stuffed – shelves, drawers, and freezer – that when he’s gone, it’s a bit like delving into a treasure chest. I’m never sure of exactly what he purchased, yet I’m always pleasantly surprised (and pleasantly impressed) by the finds.

Today I spotted two organic eggplants neatly tucked away on the bottom shelf.

Eggplant can be a bit tricky. It can cook beautifully if carmelized just the right amount, i.e. not burnt. It also tends to slurp up everything around it, i.e. oil. Somewhat tired of my eggplant repertoire (i.e. too burnt and too oily), and a bit influenced by our last Chinese restaurant visit, the idea came to perhaps try a stuffed eggplant, dim-sum style. Stuffing it with shrimp also took care of the protein requirement for dinner.

Cooking the eggplant for this dish is two part – the first happens in the pan while the second finishes in a steamer. Most recipes call for mega amounts of oil for the former, but instead I chose to lean towards a longer steam to cook the eggplant, with a shorter, much less oily pan fry. Also, instead of a thick and heavy oyster sauce, I topped the eggplant with a light and simple soy dressing.

Dim-Sum-Style Shrimp Stuffed Eggplant (serves two)

Ingredients:

2 medium sized eggplants (the narrower, the better)

10-12 large sized prawns, peeled and cleaned

4-5 tablespoons of olive oil

salt and pepper

Dressing:

3 tablespoons soy sauce

1 tablespoon sesame seed oil

2 teaspoons honey

Additionally, some type of steamer will be required – this might take some ingenuity. I used the steam tray that came with my rice cooker.

First, slice eggplant into thick 1 inch disks. Then, make a pocket in each disk by slicing parallel to the surface, about 3/4 of the way through.

To prepare the stuffing, chop shrimp into smaller, minced pieces. Place in bowl and season with salt and pepper, about 2 teaspoons of each. Mix until the shrimp begins to bind and become paste-like.

Next, fill each of the eggplant slices to the very edge with about 1 tablespoon of the shrimp mixture. (Giggle, giggle – the eggplants resembled Pac Mans… or perhaps fake teeth.)

Just finished stuffing with shrimp mixture

Over medium-high temperature, heat oil in a large pan. Place the eggplant flat in the pan and cook until browned on the bottom, about 3-4 minutes. Turn over and brown the other side as well. Following, remove from pan, place into steamer over boiling water; steam for 20-25 minutes. If pan and/or steamer are not big enough, work in batches.

Eggplant cooking in the pan

Eggplant steaming in the rice cooker steamer.

In the meantime, wisk together all ingredients for dressing.

When done, the eggplant should be fairly soft. Remove from steamer, dress, serve, eat. I added a dollop of Srirachi hot sauce for an extra zing. In hindsight, ground peanuts and chopped green scallions would have been great additions.

The stuffed eggplant ended up being beyond simple in terms of ingredients, prep and cook. Thanks, hubby, for the eggplant! A new dish awaits you upon return….

Like this:

Gazing deeply into the fridge tonight, I realized I had too many odds and ends – a carrot, half an onion, some pieces of bell pepper, and one dozen eggs. Since my husband travels a lot for work, I am left to my own devices quite often. And this is what happens. Without my biggest fan, solo meals become a bit ad-hoc and shopping gets pushed off until the next day… or sometimes the next… and soon (next x 3).

But even on my laziest of days, meals still have to be good and tasty. I opted for a Korean vegetable pancake today which, in my book, ties with fried rice for the best in cleaning-of-fridge-contents category. The pancake has a bit of a big omelette feel but better – a crunch of veggies and the slight nutty, grainy texture of a pancake. Normally, it is egg/flour based with other found ingredients thrown in – scallions, crab, shrimp, mushrooms, bell peppers – even sweet potatoes, as David Lebovitz suggests in his recipe. My current fridge contents yielded carrot, onion, red bell peppers, Italian green pepper, and imitation crab meat. Also, since I am kicking the flour habit for the next <sigh> several weeks, I came up with a gluten free version using almond flour (finely ground almonds).

For those with gluten restrictions, almond flour, with some tweaking, is a great substitute for most things requiring white or wheat flour. Spain, and especially Mallorca, is a big almond producer. Stores sell the nuts (the delicious Marcona variety) in every form – raw, roasted, salted, fried, whole, chopped, ground. My usual market carries almond flour in bulk – big huge kilo bags, which saves me from having to plug in my food processor to make it myself.

First, julienne any and all vegetable/meat/fish ingredients. I found that slicing everything as paper-thin as possible, into equivalent length strips, gave a nice texture and helped crisp up the pancake. For the carrots, I used a vegetable peeler to make the first rough cuts. Afterwards, I stacked the slivers and used a sharp paring knife to cut thin, skinny strips. For the “dough,” beat eggs, fold into almond flour, and add a couple of pinches of salt.

Next, heat 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium sized skillet over high heat. Add onions and cook until browned, 1-2 minutes. Add the rest of the accompanying ingredients and stir fry for another 2-3 minutes. After the vegetable mix is heated through, spread the mix into a single layer covering the bottom of the pan. Lower heat to medium/high and pour in dough mixture, making sure to evenly cover the vegetables. Cook for a few minutes until the bottom of the pancake begins to brown. Overall, things should start to look like they might hold together.

Some skill is required to then flip the pancake to finish the other side. The almond dough doesn’t hold together as well as flour based dough; I went for it with a spatula and the pancake broke in half during the flip. But nothing to fear. The dough can be easily coaxed back into shape – using the spatula, re-round the edges and compact together any loose bits.

After the reverse side is browned, slide the pancake onto a large dish or platter, cut and divide like a pie or pizza, and serve with the soy dipping sauce alongside. I like mine with an added bit of sriracha hot sauce.

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Today was quick meal day. At the home office and loaded with work, I wanted needed to make a simple lunch, but also craved something spicy/tasty. The other day, I had purchased a big bag of flash frozen tiger prawns from one of the local markets. The fridge still remained stocked with fresh veg from the last farmers market haul. Marrying fresh ingredients with one frozen would be a dirty but easy cheat. And the other cheat – I did it for two meals in a row.

Years back, my grand-uncle cooked a wonderful meal for my family during a visit to my grandmother’s home in Boston. His scrumptious salt and hot pepper stir fried prawns came out perfectly crisp on the outside, tender in the middle, and with seasoning that I wanted to lick off the plate. Grand-Uncle said his secret to getting the prawns to grill in the pan – dry the prawns prior to cooking. Drawing out excess moisture prevented the prawns and the rest of the ingredients from boiling in its juices. Gleaning his technique, I diligently dried my shrimp and only used a dry-spiced marinade.

I took the tiger prawns out early to defrost, but ended up soaking the prawns in a water bath as hunger overtook my patience. I drained and patted the shrimp dry with a few paper towels and then tossed all the ingredients into a bowl for a quick marinade.

In a large skillet, I heated up three big tablespoons of olive oil at the highest temperature possible and placed the shrimp in (should sizzle on contact), separating each with plenty of space in the pan. The large shrimp finished in about a minute or so on each side (pink and an opaque center) – crisp and crusty on the outside, soft but cooked through on the inside. I devoured my shrimp on a simple bed of lettuce. As the shrimp carried a lot of flavor and olive oil from the pan, there was no need for any additional dressing.

I’m a big fan of Spansh pimenton, and only the variety that is from De La Vera, and only the silkier La Chinata brand. It’s like paprika, but better; New York Times heralds it as the “smokier cousin.” I prefer the spicy picanteover the milder dulce.

The shrimp were prepared the same as previously mentioned, with all ingredients combined for a final dry marinade before cooking. I made a separate salsa fresca as an accompaniment to offset the heat and smokiness of the pimenton, with all ingredients finely chopped and mixed. I gave the tomato a quick squeeze after slicing to remove the seeds and extra juice, before finishing it with a dice. A plum added some fresh sweetness, though mango, peach, or nectarine could have also been substituted in.

After the shrimp finished, everything was plated on a bed of lettuce and half an avocado. Again, tasty with no dressing needed.

Pan cooked shrimp can be reinvented in many different ways simply by varying the seasoning – curry powders, lemon pepper, herbs de provence, seafood seasoning, chili powder, or just simple sea salt and black pepper. The shrimp can also be cooked with the shell on, which is often the preference in Chinese cooking.